Prime Minister Justin Trudeau reacted to Pierre Poilievre’s win as the new Conservative Party leader on Sept. 12 by defending his own record and attacking the new Tory leader and his policies.
“Now is not the time for politicians to exploit fears and to pit people one against the other,” Trudeau said before congratulating Poilievre for his win.
The prime minister made the comments in a speech while addressing around 150 Liberal MPs at his party’s national caucus in New Brunswick.
Trudeau criticized Poilievre for what he said were his “highly questionable, reckless economic ideas” and characterized his campaign as one of “buzzwords, dog-whistles, [and] careless attacks.”
Trudeau also went after a number of comments and concepts presented by Poilievre over the last few months.
“Attacking the institutions that make our society fair, safe, and free is not responsible leadership,” Trudeau said, in an apparent allusion to Poilievre’s criticism of the BoC.
Poilievre has been a proponent of cryptocurrencies not being at the mercy of central banks and suggested it as a means to “opt-out” of inflation during a campaign stop in London, Ont., in March. At that time, the price of Bitcoin was over $45,000. It’s been hovering around $20,000 since mid-June. In comparison, the benchmark S&P 500 was down around 13 percent over the same period.
“Telling people they can opt out of inflation by investing their savings in volatile cryptocurrencies is not responsible leadership,” said Trudeau, adding that following this advice would have resulted in the loss of life savings.
With rising inflation and cost-of-living issues impacting Canadians across the country, Poilievre has argued the issues are caused by the Liberal government’s spending, particularly during the pandemic.
“When I saw the government beginning to print money to pay for exorbitant spending, I knew that inflation was just down the road,” Poilievre said back in November 2021.
“When there is more money chasing fewer goods, we always get higher prices.”
Trudeau said opposing those federal pandemic investments was not “responsible leadership.”
“When I heard Mr. Poilievre talking about how much we wasted on Canadians over the past couple of years, let me be very clear: being there for workers, for families, for seniors, for young people, for businesses—it was the right thing to do,” said Trudeau.
Trudeau also referred to the issue of vaccines in his remarks against Poilievre, saying he is anti-vaccine, in line with criticism the Liberals often level against the Tories. Poilievre has supported vaccines during the pandemic but has criticized vaccine mandates.
“Fighting against vaccines that saved millions of lives, that’s not responsible leadership,” said Trudeau.
Trudeau also criticized the Conservative stance to unleash the Canadian oil and gas sector to generate wealth, saying it’s fighting “inflation with more pollution.”
‘Small Government’
Poilievre had addressed the Conservative caucus earlier that day in Ottawa.He said his party is open to collaboration but would not compromise on the issue of raising taxes and he challenged Trudeau to pause expected hikes in the Carbon Tax and Canada Pension Plan contributions.
“We know that when government ruins the finances of the nation, it ruins the lives of its citizens,” Poilievre said.
“And the way we transform that hurt into hope is by fighting for people’s chance to achieve their dreams through hard work.”
In opposition to Trudeau’s oft-stated position of “having Canadians’ back” by providing financial support, Poilievre instead proposed Canadians would be better served by a “small government,“ where ”the state is servant and the people are the masters.”
Poilievre and Trudeau will have a chance to face off directly when the House of Commons resumes sitting on Sept. 20.
